The big event of my week was my business trip to Albuquerque. I scrambled somewhat last minute making the travel arrangements, but everything worked out fine. The meeting was well organized. I learned much of what I'd hoped to, so it was actually a pretty productive use of my time.
Thursday night, I managed to get together with old friends from work who live out there. After we ate (blue corn enchiladas, something pretty much unobtainable here), they drove me around to see some of the odder yard decorations of the area. Those included a tiki head, a concrete rhinoceros, and something they called "chevy on a stick." They also took me past the home of a famous local architect. The house resembles a star ship and has several large modernistic sculptures (e.g. two giant metal dinosaurs) outside.
I set up my return flight to be late enough on Saturday that I had time to do the Old Town and Downtown volksmarch before going home on Saturday. It was a pleasant walk, with interesting architecture. For example, there's one downtown building that is a replica of the Doge's palace in Venice. There's also a theatre with various Southwestern themes in its design. The walk had a good mix of commercial and residential areas and was an excellent way to see a fair amount of the city. I should also note one quirky item there - a "shoe tree," i.e. a pole with a lot of odd shoes stapled to it.
I did not, alas, have time for Tinkertown, the Rattlesnake Museum, the National Atomic Museum, or the Turquoise Museum. I'm told that there are actually respectable, non-weird tourist attractions, too, though why anybody would do those is beyond me.
My flight was delayed and I had to run to make my connection in Denver. The woman sitting next to me had nearly missed the plane because she didn't understand time zones and hadn't changed her watch when flying to Denver from the west coast. After that, she still got confused about how long she had before her next flight! It's not like they didn't announce the time change twice. Some people should probably never travel.
Copyright 2004 Miriam H. Nadel